Berlin

Traveling to Berlin was great. I wasn't really looking forward to the trip before I left, but it really turned around. I was traveling with 5 friends and it was technically a class trip for the UCD engineering school. I'm not an engineer but I tagged along. We had a really early flight, 6 20 am, and I slept the entire way on the plane. Then, getting to the hostel took forever. We spent a really long time trying to figure out the train tickets and everything of that sort. We were seriously at a loss. After traveling another 2 hours by train, we finally reached our hostel. The Odessy. It was a cute place and it had character. We even had our own room. We were to stay there for the first night and the other three nights we had to move hostels to, The Generator. This is where all of the Irish kids were staying for the trip.

The first day wasn't anything to exciting. We were exhausted from traveling and it was freezing, so we decided to just eat and chill out. We took a nap and then we decided we wanted to go out for the night. We drank a bit and went out to a bar for happy hour. I had my first cosmopolitan! After that we headed to a dance club, The Matrix. It was crazy. There were a ton of people dancing and there was even a cage with a dancer inside it. It was quite a site. By the end of the night we were all thorougly exhasuted. It was an interesting night to say the least.

The second day we tried to be a little more adventerous. We switched hostels and decided to go walk around the city center. We made our way towards the Berlin wall and saw the beautiful artwork of the east side gallery. I also got my passport stamped! Checking that out was really interesting. After that, we checked out the TV tower and this really big mall. Unfortunately, everything inside the mall was closed because it was a sunday. I was so sad. That night I decided I didn't want to go out a second night in a row so I chilled and took it easy. I went out to dinner with Taylor at this Italian resturant, and HA! I got my food served to me in the shape of a heart. It was epic. The waiter was really funny and my food was very tasty. It was a pretty fun day.

This is a picture of the Generator. It's huge!

Berlin Wall

The third day we decided to check out the third reich. We saw where Hitler's Bunker used to be and we saw other important building relating to the holocaust. Also, we saw the reichminster and the gate. Both were good finds. But I think the best find, was finding a VAPIANOS! I was SO excited. I haven't had Vapianos since December and I was really craving it. We ate their for lunch and I got my usual dish of spicy crawfish and lobster sauce. It was so satisfying. After this we were all very exhausted and decided to nap again. When we were hungry, we went back to the Italian resturant we were at the night before. This time, my food got served with a rose carved from a tomato on the top. I laughed. After drinking a bit at dinner (I had my first Sex on the Beach! YUM!) we went out on a short pub crawl. Unfortunately, in Germany's pubs, you can smoke. At the end of the night I reeked of smoke and there was nothing I could do about it. I couldn't do laundry and I didn't have extra jeans or other clothes to change into. So I was forced to smell of smoke for the next day and a half..

My LOVE!

And this was my dinner, with a rose made from a tomato!

The fourth day was the most adventerous, and the saddest. Most of the Irish kids left, and 3 left from the group I traveled with. So me and two others made our way to Sauchsenhausen, the Concentration Camp Memorial. After some mix ups with google maps, we finally arrived there. It was very powerful, and very scary. Actually being there made things really difficult and it was hard to be in some of the buildings and read some of the information. A lot of it was restored for the memorial, but some of the original floors and walls were still there. It was pretty scary. We saw the gas chambers and read stories about events members of the concentration camps had witnessed. We were only there for two hours, but it really made the day sad.

Where they burned the dead at the concentration camp...

After that we went back to the Italian resturant one LAST time. (The food was good, so we kept wanting to go back!) My meal was in the shape of a heart again and it was very tasty. That night we just chilled out at the hostel and talked with some people. And now I'm spending some time on the computer. Oops. Overall I thought Berlin was really interesting. My first impression of it was pretty low, there was graffitti everywhere and it seemed pretty run down. Then I realized we were staying in East Berlin. West Berlin is a lot more built up with a lot less vandalism, overall it was just more modern. The area where the concentration camp is more what I expected Germany to look like. The buidlings were cuter and the roads were made out of stone. But during the train ride to that area there were houses that were no bigger than a small apartment. I'm not sure if I can even call them houses, maybe just small shacks. So there is just a lot of diversity on how everything looks.

View of the TV tower from my hostel

We flew home today. This week should prove to be exciting and very interesting. Hopefully it goes well one way or another. I'm on my way to Paris on Saturday and Barcelona on Monday. Then St. Patricks day is on Wednesday. It should be a fast paced second half of spring break to say the least. I'm anxious and excited. =)